Prince of Pull

[_cato_]

so wait you are purposely keeping the rest under 90 seconds for the 10x3? I dont really see a benefit for doing that. on sets geared for strength you usually want to take as much rest as possible.

Like Mike said, the main proponent of that routine (or training technique, whatever you want to call it) gives a time range of 60-120 for the sets. By choosing a time in the middle (ie 90), he's got multiple progression options, if necessary. Given that there are so many sets being performed, fatigue, and therefore rest period, becomes more and more of a factor. Holding the rest time at roughly the same time between every set allows you to see whether you are actually progressing.

Otherwise you can run into a scenario like the following:

Week 1: You complete 10x3 at 250 lbs, taking 60 seconds in between sets.
Week 2: You complete 10x3 at 255 lbs, taking 90 seconds in between sets.
Week 3: You complete 10x3 at 260 lbs, taking 120 seconds in between sets.

Is this progress? Maybe, maybe not. Maybe you could've done week 3's workload on week 1; maybe not.

In contrast, holding the time roughly steady better allows you to control and monitor progress, since any increase in weight now means you are definitely stronger.

Mike more or less already said all this, just unpacking it a bit.

 

[_cato_]

yessir week 3 today

Edit: Btw, I answered your question about your military press on the last page, if you otherwise miss/missed it.

Been thinking of incorporating some version of coan-phillipi into my training, but I don't want to stop squatting 2x a week. Seems like an iffy proposition to try and do that, cause I hear the routine pretty much torches the lower back. My sense is that I would have to remove most (if not all) of the assistance work, if I was going to do it like that. Even then it might be too ridiculous.

I'm definitely interested in hearing about your experience with it, while front squatting heavy once a week (if I recall correctly that's what you're doing right now).

 

[miked8c]

I'll keep you posted Cato.

Right now I front squat on Mondays and DL on Fridays(give myself 4 days between a leg day and my DL workout). I don't do any lower body assistance for my front squats and instead go straight into weighted pull ups after squatting. This is fine because I am mainly squatting for overall strength and could give two sh**s about quad development.

However today I am going in to do front squat and my back is still sore from my DL workout 3 days ago. Possibly because I got drunk the night of my DL workout and only really got 2 full nights of recovery in rather than three.

Regardless I'll let you know how the Coan works out.

 

[miked8c]

Bench
95x3
135x3
185x3
225x3
262.5x10x3

Funny little story, no big confrontation ending so don't set your standards to high.


So I go to the Y, its a couple of towns over from me, its clientele is mainly old men, milfs, and teenage punks. Today was a bench workout so I got into the weightlifting area and threw on some quarters for my first warm up set. After this set I get up and kind of check out the lay of the land, who's in the gym today? any hot girls? That sort of stuff.

There is this kid I see every few times I workout, he always wears a sleeveless basketball jersey. He's a prettyboy, probably 6 foot, maybe 6'1, I think about 20 yo. So about 3 inches taller than I. Probably weighs about 215, pretty decent sized kid, big arms decent sized upper body. Loves his beach muscles, likes to look good when he lifts.

Now compared to me, about 5'9 200lbs, wearing my velcro weightlifting shoes, long ass socks that are raised to just under my knee, yellow Billabong T-shirt, and scruffy ass neckbeard. Polar opposites.

As I start putting up more weight on my warm up sets, this kid starts watching me, he can tell he is no longer the center of attention in the gym.

So he gets off his cable crossovers and hops onto a bench. In this gym there are four benches, he hops onto the one that is directly opposite of mine. So we are essentially facing each other whenever we are not laying onto the bench doing a set. I finish my last warm up set and put on the plates of my working weight. As you can tell by my listed weights I use smaller increments for micro loading. 262.5 is, 2 45's, 10,5,2.5,and finally a 1.25. Basically a pyramid hanging off the bar.

Once I put on the weight that I will be using for the next ten sets I leave to take a piss before I begin my workout. I get into the Locker room and remember why I hate the Y. There are naked dudes walking a less than 1 mph all over the place, it takes me a full 30 seconds to walk across the locker room to reach the urinals. When I finally complete my journey I am forced to use a urinal right next to some dude who has Downes Syndrome and is pissing with his pants all the way down and his ass hanging out.

Anyways I get back to the weight room and the kid has 265 loaded up on the bar, 2.5 lbs. more than me, whoopdeedoo. I get under the bar and blast out my first set of 3 like I was benching the bar, I check the time on the clock because in 70 seconds I need to do my next set.

The kid, not to be outdone, gets under the bar and unracks it. So far so good... than he begins to lower the bar... and then pushes it back up once it gets to about 8 inches above his chest. He does 4 of these, "extensions", and then racks the bar.

I do my second set of 262. I sit up and watch him take off the two tens and put on a 25, 275. I do my third set. I finish it and he is still sitting there prepping himself. He does a set of 4 "reps" with this weight, I'm talking a ROM of about 6 inches. He then watches me do my fourth set( of a real ROM) and realizes that I have done twice the number of sets that he has done with better form making it look easy. I can tell he is a little pissed, he gets under 275 for his 2nd set with that weight.

Unracks the bar and lowers it, and lowers it, and lowers it. He actually touched his chest! Now for the eccentric portion of the lift. Oh wait, the bar didn't even budge of his chest.

I hop of my bench and run over grabbing the bar and spotting him to get it off his chest. He goes "Thanks man", unracks his crap and goes back to the cable crossover.

On my 10th set I ask him to spot me, he says "Let me finish this first". I go to the bench and wait while he does 5 reps that accomplished nothing other than stall him from spotting me. He then spots me on my last spot which I knew I would need absolutely no help on, I blast it out and say thanks.

End of story.

 

[lweaver]

What a douche. So you're hitting 275 on a 10x3? Thats fuckin awesome.

 

[_cato_]

Haha.. Situations like those always give you that satisfied feeling. Always risky asking for a spot from somehow who does exercises with 1/4 or 1/2 range of movement...lol. In their mind, even if the spotter is doing half the work, it's probably still a "good rep."

Out of curiosity (and totally unrelated to that), when you've done you're dynamic benching in the past, about how long of a pause did you use at the bottom?

 

[miked8c]

First off, I was doing 262.5 for 10x3. Not 275.


And Cato, I would not exactly call what I am doing dynamic benching. I thought dynamic bench was more like 60% of your max and you did it purely for speed. When I did that my sets were more like 4 seconds, now with the heavier weight my sets take almost 9 seconds.


To answer your question I have never done a bench routine where I paused at the bottom of the rep.

Just so you know, I have been having some upper back issues. Its whatever muscle that is located on my lefts shoulder blade. I think all this back volume is catching up to me.

I am going to have to halt the Coan/Phillipi routine and restart it in a few weeks when school starts back up. This way I will be boozing less, eating more and have more time to dedicate towards lifting and recovery.

For my deadlift day I will instead be doing a 3x3-5 with whatever weight feels right. Probably working around the 440's

 

[_cato_]

And Cato, I would not exactly call what I am doing dynamic benching. I thought dynamic bench was more like 60% of your max and you did it purely for speed. When I did that my sets were more like 4 seconds, now with the heavier weight my sets take almost 9 seconds.

Nah I know you aren't doing dynamic benching right now; what you're saying here is correct.

I was just curious about your technique when you were doing dynamic benching on the dave tate program etc. But yeah, you answered my question.

 

[miked8c]

Nah I know you aren't doing dynamic benching right now; what you're saying here is correct.

I was just curious about your technique when you were doing dynamic benching on the dave tate program etc. But yeah, you answered my question.

Ok gotcha. On that dynamic bench there was no pausing at the bottom, touch the chest and explode.

 

[JDid23]

lmao what a fucking douche. i enjoyed the story.. always douche bags like that bro